Whereas transplantation technology of both solid organs and hematopoietic cells has the potential to cure a variety of disorders, there are still treatment-related mortalities associated with these procedures, including toxicities of chemoradiotherapy, infectious complications, and Graft-versus-Host Disease (GVHD). These related mortalities restrict the application of transplantation technology.
In GVHD, immune cells in a transplanted graft recognize the host as foreign, and mount an immune response to the host. GVHD can occur when either tissue or cells are transplanted (e.g. a solid organ or hematopoietic cells). Alternatively, a host can recognize the transplanted tissue or cell as foreign. Hence, there is a need in the art for methods of inducing in vivo tolerance to a foreign tissue or cell in a subject.